United States: World Babysitter

As far as I can tell, this is an exclusively punitive action. "You follow our rules, or else!" There is not much reward to be gained from such posturing. The men with guns are not too threatened by the ape pounding its chest.

Besides, cruise missiles are expensive, and the US is not in the position to be burning through military resources.

Is there more to this than I'm seeing? Is there any potential benefit to the US for punishing other governments? Or is that not what is happening?

In this case, the US is the ape. The chest pounding refers to the arrogant decision to hit Syria with missile strikes. It is practically an attempt to prove what a threat the US is to naughty countries.

The rest of the world are men with guns. The guns are economic weapons, not military ones, I suppose. Still it gives them the capability to hurt the US without tangling physically (militarily).

Then, these missile strikes would only be happening if the US has no choice in the matter.

No, these missile strikes would happen because the US has already gotten noticeably stirred up by the situation and to back down from it would make us look like pussies on the world stage.

This isn't OMG ZOG IS XPLOITING TEH USA. Israel doesn't really stand to gain anything because both Assad's regime as well as the rebels are hostile to them. It's purely a proxy war between the West and Russia/China.

It is also easy to back away from something like this, the UK has already done so. Any gesture from the Syrians can be used as an excuse. They can even extend some kind of diplomatic initiative. Perhaps we could discover that the strikes were by rebels after all (which seems quite credible).

Look, I know the whole Jewish conspiracy thing is played out. This is why I must stress that this is not conspirational. It is quite open. With the situation in Syria worsened by American intervention, Israel gains an excuse for aggressive measures in the name of defense versus terrorist infiltration. The Golan Heights can be more formally annexed. Why would there be a proxy war over Syria of all places? The behaviour of Russia is reactionary, it is responding to this unilateral act of overt aggression. Only Israel stands to gain in any real fashion from this. They are spared expense and the lives of their own soldiers, why should they not make full use of this opportunity? Jewish racial chauvinism is a matter of history, and in the Middle East the US has a record of acting as the arm of Israel for decades.

Why the antagonism with Iran? Why even Iraq? Do these make sense in retrospect? Remember one of the primary grievances of Al-Qaeda is these very actions. So how does the US benefit from this? Quite simply it does not, and these decisions are the consequence of the disproportionate influence of Jewish and Zionist elements in the US government.

In these matters it is always enlightening to look at who benefits. Look at the warning Iran gave, they understand this situation. If the US acts in Syria they have warned that Syria will attack Israel. Now doesnt that seem rather spiteful and unnecessary even if Israel is an ally of the US? Perhaps it would be easy to believe that a crazed Arab dictator would do such a thing, which really does help the overall narrative. Assad is not crazed though.

Syria is actually a strong model for control of a state by a minority overclass. Like the tutsis and the hutus, and as some believe like American Jews and American Whites. I dont subscribe to this, but there is some truth to the matter.

While Syria is the only major oil producer in its immediate vicinity, the matter of oil is secondary. Even if the US had to do without Middle-Eastern oil, it could. The importance of oil is vastly overstated. In addition, Saudi Arabia and the UAE also have nationalized oil industries, and remain allies with no question of US antagonism. Oil will definitely play a part if this situation escalates, like it has in Iraq.

"I was always a critic of the U.S. government, but I was once somebody who fundamentally believed in the possibility of democratic change. And what Iíve really come to realize being in prison, is that the U.S. government is fundamentally illegitimate. This is a group of extremely violent, essentially criminal people, not just in the United States towards their own citizens but internationally. And they claim to be promoting democracy or the empowerment of people, but what theyíre really promoting is their own power over people in the name of democracy. Democracy for them has really become, the world democratic revolution I should say, has really become for them what the world workerís revolution was for the Soviet Union. And they really donít scruple against using the same tactics here domestically that the Soviets used to control their own citizenry and Iíve unfortunately sort of been trapped in the middle of this."

Then, these missile strikes would only be happening if the US has no choice in the matter.

No, these missile strikes would happen because the US has already gotten noticeably stirred up by the situation and to back down from it would make us look like pussies on the world stage.

This isn't OMG ZOG IS XPLOITING TEH USA. Israel doesn't really stand to gain anything because both Assad's regime as well as the rebels are hostile to them. It's purely a proxy war between the West and Russia/China.

What Trystero said. But I'd also like to add that if Assad's regime was replaced with a more extremist one the USA would have another excuse to invade in the next 5 to 15 years. Don't forget Afghanistan, it was the same situation "Hey, let's help the mujahideen! At least they're not socialists!" Then later "Hey, those mujahideen are a threat to our way of life, let's invade and force a government more friendly to the west!" Getting rid of Assad and causing more chaos in Syria by helping the fundamentalist rebels paves the way to a new 'intervention'